What ‘Platonic’ Means Online

Why would one person seek another in our cynical world if not for goods, services, sex or money?

With my question in mind, I turned to the strange section of Craigslist labeled Strictly Platonic.

Craigslist, the online classified-ad emporium that now attracts more than 20 billion page views every month, promotes transactional relationships. People find uses for other people — very specific uses. In Lost and Found, you’re valuable to the degree that you’ve found a Jack Russell terrier in East Meadow, N.Y., or a crucifix on Meschutt Beach in Hampton Bays. On the notorious Casual Encounters section, you’re valuable — to one “insatiable married woman in search of FUN,” anyway — if you’re “cute, outgoing, live in Brooklyn (near Kings Plaza), under 33, have a car.”

On Strictly Platonic, I wondered if I would find people who consider themselves above the specialized, commodified human relationships that are the stock-in-trade of Web matchmaking. Could Strictly Platonic denizens be actual Platonists of one kind or another, looking for something deeper or higher than they might find on sections like Biz Dev or Women Seeking Women or even Misc Romance?

Plato’s theory of forms, after all, has it that beyond the material world — the all-too-human world that’s anatomized in icky detail in the vast majority of Craigs­list postings — are ideal archetypes. These archetypes are the most real things in the universe. A platonic relationship is, therefore, a human relationship that inspires appreciation for the idealized human, the divine. The relationship must be chaste lest it become an end in itself and a distraction from spiritual matters.

The Strictly Platonic section of the New York City Craigslist — while corrupted here and there by those seeking sexual relationships that they imagine might be more interesting or plausible under the misleading “platonic” banner — is filled with minds seeking other minds. As if to certify noncarnal intentions, more than one poster emphasizes that appearance doesn’t matter. As someone puts it: “I don’t need a pic nor want to know if you’re skinny, normal, ‘curvy,’ whatever.” The odd “I couldn’t/could care less” locution also appears with some frequency in Strictly Platonic, often with respect to age and race.

And while they stress their lofty indifferences, the members of the Strictly Platonic crowd are equally passionate about their desire: conversation, conversation, conversation. Live, e-mail, phone, text, chat — platonic people, it seems, want people to talk to.

Photo

Credit
Masha Krasnova-Shabaeva

A 55-year-old man wants someone to read a “nice thoughtful e-mail” from him every morning. A 40-year-old man seeks “systematic, rigorous thinkers” to talk over “philosophy, aesthetics, linguistics and economic theory.” A 54-year-old woman looks for phone talks about “job, men, losing weight, goals we hope to accomplish.” A woman imagines a group of women discussing whether “pets have spirituality, why we are here, the role of spiritual leaders and masters, sowing and reaping or the ‘law of returns,’ what possibly could happen after death and much more.”

Some posters on Strictly Platonic want to buy things for other people; some posters want things bought for them. One woman is eager to listen to any guy, any guy at all, natter on about Park Slope in Brooklyn — “You can show me where you like to shop, tell me some history about the area or chitchat about whatever you want” — if he will treat her to a single glass of wine. Another one is willing to pick up the tab for everything and even prove that his wife knows he is on Craigslist looking for female friends, if a woman will just go see some plays with him.

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A Strictly Platonic poster generally has something in the world he desires to see or enjoy — something grand, like nature, philosophy, “all the city has to offer” — and he has discovered he needs another person to help him do it. But he doesn’t want to fall in love with that person, or not just yet; so he asks for someone to go biking with — or swimming. Or bar-hopping.

The forum is enlightening because it represents a collaborative effort to define “platonic” — and define it against nearly everything else on Craigslist. You would think the word would be debased by now. But it’s surprisingly intact. Maybe that’s why we still need some notion of platonism in everyday life. Once we’ve stipulated that commercial culture is that which debases everything, we need a popular concept that helps us resist debasement.

Points of Entry: This Week's Recommendations

IT'S ALL GREEK For the Hellenist who has everything, consider "Apanta ta tou Platonos. Omnia Platonis Opera," from Krown & Spellman Booksellers, available on Abebooks for $65,000. It's a 1513 Venetian edition in Greek, with a Welsh inscription.

WHAT DEBT CRISIS? Lots of localized Strictly Platonic listings contribute to the pop definition of "platonic." When it comes to Plato's homeland, however, you'll find "Party people looking for more party people!!" On Craigslist Greece.

SOUL WINDOWS Strictly Platonic is to philosophical loners as Craigslist's Missed Connections is to romantic hipsters. The New York City version of the section, where posters register fleeting glances, is heavy on eye-contact encounters on the L train to and from Brooklyn.

A version of this article appears in print on July 25, 2010, on Page MM16 of the Sunday Magazine with the headline: Just Friends. Today's Paper|Subscribe